


this is my body, which is broken for you

by potter



Category: Critical Role (Web Series)
Genre: Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence, Caleb wants to devour Fjord, Eldritch Abominations, Essek wants to watch Fjord being devoured, Fjord wants to go home, Identity Issues, Interrogation, M/M, Power Dynamics, Scourger Caleb, magical torture, xhorhas trash party
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2020-05-05
Updated: 2020-05-05
Packaged: 2021-03-03 04:08:20
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 7,694
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/24028654
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/potter/pseuds/potter
Summary: The Dynasty catches a scourger, and it's Fjord's job to find out what he knows. By whatever means necessary.
Relationships: Fjord/Caleb Widogast, Fjord/Essek Thelyss, Fjord/Essek Thelyss/Caleb Widogast
Comments: 11
Kudos: 90





	this is my body, which is broken for you

**Author's Note:**

> WARNING for interrogation, non-graphic magical torture, descriptions of the aftereffects of torture, and weird power dynamics between everyone. additionally, there are multiple references to canon-typical levels of violence done to fjord. 
> 
> please note that these warnings are for part 1; part 2, which is halfway written, may have additional warnings, including sexual content.

The scourger didn’t look up when they entered, and he doesn’t look up now. 

There’s blood at his temple and also on his neck, and probably in other places Essek doesn’t want Fjord to see. The soldiers have put him in their heaviest chains; they force the scourger’s body into an awkward angle, like a ship’s spar snapped clean in half. His breath comes loud and ragged. Fjord’s is steady. He still doesn’t know if Essek needs to breathe.

Fjord steps from the shadows. A small _tsssssk_ from behind him makes him stop just out of reach of the bars. He carefully positions himself so that the tip of his toes are a solid centimeter behind the antimagic field, and draws his cloak back behind his shoulders for good measure. There’s no way the scourger can get to him, but Essek worships at the altar of precaution. It would seem funny if it were anyone else.

Essek said they captured him a week ago; the days haven’t treated him well. His traveling cloak is tattered, and his skin has gone gray around the edges. Head bowed, his hair obscuring his eyes and most of his face, leaving Fjord’s imagination to fill in the rest. Men cut their hair short in Xhorhas and in Port Damali, too, but the scourger’s falls around his face as long as any lady’s. It’s strange, Fjord thinks, that there’s no torchlight down here, just driftglobes casting their sullen shadows on the wall, and still his autumn-bright hair shines like a bonfire. 

He’s allowed to think things like that. He died earlier today. 

They came back to Roshana less than triumphant, some bruises and a hole where Clay’s eye used to be the only proof they even left. The Laughing Hand fucked them in all ways but one, and seemed to be enjoying itself in the process. Beau says it’s because they didn’t plan enough; Fjord says it’s because they didn’t plan well enough; Clay says nothing, because he’s still unconscious. 

They told no one they were back, but within the hour there was Essek in the foyer, politely requesting Fjord’s company on a walk. The first time he came to fetch Fjord, Jester got a look on her face that made Beau elbow her in the stomach so hard she couldn’t find her breath for half a minute. This morning, nothing about Essek or his intentions for Fjord seemed funny: “When you brought him back last time,” she told him, drawing herself up to all her four foot ten inches, including the horns, “he couldn’t talk for a day. You know this, Mr. Essek? Your soldiers carried him home, but you knew he couldn’t speak. Yes?” Her expression, so guileless. Her eyes, so wide. 

Essek had smiled. He’d offered Fjord his arm, and Fjord had taken it without looking Jester’s way. Essek’s grip was tight. Not enough to bruise. But enough to remember. 

“Your name,” Fjord says. The scourger says nothing.

They let him keep his clothes. The thick, scratchy wool would name him Empire even if his personage didn’t scream it, scraggly harvest hair and fingernails dark with soot and ink. However he got here, he’s on the wrong side of the map.

The scourger keeps his eyes down. His chains are plain-cut steel, but after a week down here the walls - lead mixed with iron fillings shaved fine as sawdust - must be closing in on him. Fjord’s fingertips tingle even at this proximity. Essek once told him, casual-like, as though tossing off a slightly interesting bit of cultural trivia, that three in ten arcane casters go insane if left in a mage prison longer than a month. Fjord, taking it as some off-color Krynn joke, had laughed. Essek had too. 

He flexes his fingers, cracks his knuckles. “Your name, please,” he repeats. 

The only sound the scourger makes is a slight wheeze.

Essek shifts. Slowly, carelessly, one arm crossing over the other. He’s impatient - no, amused? As many times as they’ve done this, Fjord always wishes he had a script. 

Directly asking won’t work - it never has. But the scourger is young, alone, hurt. Maybe- 

“Listen, kid.” He summons Vladmir, soft-haired slip of an Issrylan who’d shit himself if Vandran so much as looked his way, shapes his voice into that high, taut-wire tremble. “You’ve been in this cell a while, yeah? And it’s bad. Trust me, I know.” Little weak smile, the scourger still isn’t looking but Fjord knows that this gets under people’s skin, this sniveling, pathetic flavor of sweet. “Spent time down here myself. Too much time. I promise you, if you don’t talk it’s gonna get worse. Pelor’s light, it’s gonna get worse.” 

The scourger tries to jerk his shoulder in on itself like a cat curling into his curve. The chains stop him short. They hurt, Fjord knows, he’s seen the way they bruise, but the scouger bears it silently. 

Fjord ducks his head, trying to find the eyes beneath that tangle of hair. “I’m on your side, I promise. I know it doesn’t seem like it now, but I am. I just need your help, so I can help you. Okay? Let’s start easy, yeah? Just - give me your name.” 

A second. Two. The scourger looks up. 

His skin: waxy. His eyes: waterlogged. His tone: scathing.

 _Oh_ , Fjord thinks, same as every other time. _So this is the enemy_. 

He doesn’t look away from Fjord. Not when Essek barks out a laugh that makes Fjord near jump out of his skin. Not when Essek touches Fjord’s shoulder, or when he tugs him not gently to his feet. Not, Fjord guesses, when the soldiers swing the cell doors shut behind them and bar it tight with iron and spells and with prayer, too. 

“You won’t get anyone out of that one,” Essek says. He’s still smiling. Fjord wants to sew his mouth corners down. “Tomorrow, maybe, but not today.” 

“What did he say?” 

“It’s difficult in Common, but the closest translation would be…” He doesn’t bother lowering his voice. One of the soldiers, a woman Fjord saw take down a nest of gloomstalkers out near Deepriver single handed, blushes, and so does Fjord.

Strange kind of mother, would name her son that.

He waits until they’ve climbed out of the Dungeons of Penance to round on Essek. “You pulled me out too fast, Shadowhand.” 

Essek tucks his hands in his overly embroidered robes, relaxes his shoulders, gives Fjord a look he doesn’t want to waste time unpacking. “Is that so?” 

“Yeah. _Yeah_. You’ve never cut the rope that fast before, not even when…” Don’t need to keep going, they both know how that sentence ends right up to the punctuation. “All this one had a chance to do was spit some Dwarvish, that’s such a big threat you need to rescue me?”

“Zemnian.” 

“What?” 

Essek looks so pleased with himself that Fjord could deck him right here, right now. He doesn’t think anyone would stop him. He stares at Essek’s face, at the spot right beneath his cheekbone, the one aching for a bruise, and doesn’t realize the Shadowhand is waiting for a reply until the silence begins to curdle. 

“Sorry, can you repeat that?” 

Essek flicks his sleeves out in front of him, which means irritated, but not angry. “The language the scourger was speaking. It was Zemnian, not Dwarvish. They speak it in the Zemni Fields.” 

“So? We already knew he’s an Empire butcher.” 

Essek frowns and opens his mouth, closes it, looks around. Makes a twitching motion with his fingers. Instantly, the city around them vanishes into an irritant buzz, a cone of silence protecting them from nearby perked ears. 

“We knew he was a scourger, yes. But until today the man did not speak. He could be from anywhere in the Empire, or even beyond. He could be _anyone_. But if he’s from the Zemni Fields… Think, Fjord. Think where they’re near to.” 

He squints at Essek. “Rexxentrum.” 

“Very good. And within Rexxentrum sits…” 

“The Cerberus Assembly.” Recognition dawns slowly. His mouth falls open. “The blade we recovered…” 

Fjord wonders if Essek knows that his eyes glint whenever he smiles true. 

“We didn’t learn nothing, my friend.” Essek puts a hand on Fjord’s shoulder and squeezes. “We learned all we need to make a start.” 

Fjord doesn’t flinch at the touch. He’s more proud of himself than he’d like to admit. 

It started as a favor.

The prisoner was from an Orc tribe that roamed near Port Zoon; of course Essek had soldiers who could speak the language, but none who knew the Menagerie dialect. 

“I grew up speaking Common,” Fjord tried to explain, “you probably know it better than me,” but Essek just gave that infuriating smile Fjord would later catalogue as _I always know better than you_ and tugged him along. 

The woman had swollen eyes and one broken tusk. Fjord could barely understand anything she said except for a few words, _home_ and _son_ and _please_. If Fjord was a little more naive and a few years younger, his heart might have hurt. Instead he let the woman ramble on and on, nodding occasionally without interrupting, until finally her voice gave out and all she had left to give was a bewildered, terrified sob. 

By the time she broke, Fjord had edged close enough to the bars that it was only natural for her to reach out and touch his face, the only kind one she’d been allowed to see in days. _My son is dead_ , she’d told him. _My son was killed_. 

“I know,” he told her, but he said it with a soft tone, the one the woman who taught him his letters had used when he couldn’t remember whether it was ‘t’ or ‘l’ that got the cross; and so she heard _I’m sorry_.

After that, it was only a matter of time before she was explaining in halting Common where her tribe’s leader had stashed the mysterious chest they’d found washed up in the tide. She didn’t look at Fjord during the telling, her cheeks flushed emerald with shame. Fjord was able to hide his triumph, but only just. Essek hadn’t bothered. 

He’d come again a week later. This time, it was a drow wearing the same uniform as Essek's soldiers. After three hours of stubborn silence Fjord, more out of frustration than anything, had summoned the Plank King’s snarl and Lorenzo’s barking voice; the man was blubbering a confession within minutes. Essek’s face, once more, was beatific. 

The third time. The fourth time. The fifth time. 

“How did you learn how to do that?” Essek had inevitably asked. He seemed genuinely curious, as though he wanted to know Fjord for Fjord, and not just what that knowledge might contribute to the Dynasty. It was flattering, to be of interest, to be _interesting_. 

“Don’t know. I’ve always been able to pick up voices, mannerisms.” Not exactly the truth, but not exactly a lie. Essek _hmm_ ed, a sound Fjord would know later, but didn’t know then. 

The subject was dropped, and while Fjord knew that Essek began to watch him more closely, observing the way he moved and talked and stood, he tried to ignore the pricke at the back of his neck. He didn’t quite agree with Beau, that Essek would tear them open and reassemble them into Dynasty windup soldiers if he knew all of their powers; but that didn’t make the Shadowhand’s gaze any less uncomfortable. 

The worst times were when he enjoyed it.

It didn’t matter, anyhow; a month later the assassin came for the Bright Queen, and if Essek hadn’t known what Fjord could do (what all of them could truly do), he sure as hell did after that night. And that, of course, was when it all went to hell. 

They don’t go back the next day, because Fjord dies again. 

(In his defense, the red-haired woman could melt through the floor. How do you defend against _that_?)

Nobody else is around when Essek comes for him the third day. It’s becoming more and more common lately. Nott spends most of her free days visiting her husband at his “quarters” in the Professor’s tower (a courtesy Essek never mentions but which always burns in the back of Fjord’s mind). Jester is probably off on some weird mission from her heretic god, and Beau has her mysterious liaisons in the city. Fjord has no earthly idea how Clay spends his time, and Yasha- Well. The house is usually silent, and cold, too. 

When the front door opens he’s sitting on the living room carpet, peering down at the black-red gash bisecting his chest. Jester staunched the bleeding when she revived him, but there’s no cleric spell to stop scarring. Fjord doesn’t dislike it, if he’s being honest - it makes him look dangerous, like he’s been cut wide open and sewn back up full with danger and other people’s blood. When Essek finds him he’s probing a sharpened fingertip in the wound, trying to see how much pressure it takes for it to start hurting again. Not much. 

Essek keeps his strange look even after Fjord’s shrugged his undershirt and armor back on. It’s one Fjord hasn’t seen before, so he files it away in the back of his head to study and compare and eventually master. Essek is silent as they stalk through the Firmaments, which suits Fjord fine. It’s early enough in the day that Rosohna hasn’t fully shaken herself awake, and the people out this early, an orcish woman with a bundle of laundry, an old goliath leaning heavy on a cane thick as Fjord’s torso, are easier to return smiles than their fellows. Fjord likes that, likes to see and to be seen as something worthy of a kind word. 

It isn’t until they reach the Shadowspire’s glimmering subterranean steps that Essek finally speaks. “I did not know your injuries were so… extensive.”

Fjord wrinkles his forehead. “I did die.”

Essek waves Fjord’s mortality away with a careless motion. “Yes, but from what I understand fatalities are not an uncommon element in your line of work.” Fjord shrugs. “That cut, though. It looked quite. Quite deep.”

Compassion sounds awkward coming from the Shadowhand. Fjord looks down, and then away. “Not any worse than what we do to them down there.” He jerks his head, unnecessarily, towards the staircase.

Essek doesn’t respond, and Fjord doesn’t look at his face to see what his expression does. But he can guess. 

“Come, Fjord. Faster.”

Essek is so far ahead Fjord can barely see his shadow. They’re in the deep, deep dungeons, so far beneath the surface it’s hard to imagine anything, even the Bright Queen’s mercy, could take root. The tunnel swallows Essek’s voice, the walls absorbing his vowels: _fssssstr, fssssstr_. Fjord hurries to obey.

The scourger looks no worse than he did yesterday, which means he looks like shit. His head is still bowed, but when Fjord approaches he peeks up at him from beneath the fringe. Blue eyes. A pinched nose, a weak chin. Red marks around his neck that weren’t there three days ago.

Once, a few months back, an ill-planned infiltration mission saw Fjord’s life being strangled out of him by a creature that looked, smelled, and fought like a troll, but was bizarrely articulate about the precise way and order it wanted to crush each and every one of Fjord’s neck bones. Beau tells him it was halfway done by the time they were able to rescue him; even after Clay brought him back to life, he had difficulty breathing for a week. Sometimes he wakes up to his breath gone and a wild, unsettled fear perched on his shoulders, digging its claws into his vertebrae. He doesn’t think a troll did this to the scourger. 

“You’re lucky,” Fjord says, “that you’re being given another chance. Most people’d be dead by now,” he adds. “This part is gonna hurt, but it doesn’t have to. If you answer my questions, if you listen to me, I can get you out of here, get you a bath, some food, healing-” 

“I would rather make deals with the master, not the dog.” 

The scourger’s Common is coarse, like sandpaper, or rough unfinished wood. For a moment Fjord’s too distracted to process the words behind the accent, but when he does there’s heat in his cheeks and at the back of his neck. The light should be too low in here for anyone to notice, but Essek’s eyes have never missed anything, and when the scourger’s mouth twitches into a mean little smile Fjord guesses it’s the same with him. Fjord wants to find that woman from a few nights ago and ask her to teach him how to sink into the floor, and also why she stuck him in the belly with a blade full of poison. 

“That man’s not my master, and I don’t gotta ask permission for anything. I was in your position once, I was in that cell once, and I promise you, what happens in there’ll be worse than anything I ask you to do. Which is simple, isn’t it?” Soft voice, softer eyes. “Just tell me your name.” 

“Go fuck your mother.” 

Well, fuck Vladmir. Fjord instead thinks about Avantika, the way she crooked her hips, her mouth, her eyebrows, the way her sneer made pirate kings and oceans tremble with fear and wanting. “Listen, _Soldat_. I’m trying to help you. Why do you think that I’m the one questioning you? I’m the only one that made it out of that cell, and I’m the only one standing between me,” he gestures to himself, “and him.” The scourger’s eyes flick from Fjord to Essek, and Fjord’s not displeased to see the faintest, ugly-pink flush creep up his neck. 

Inspiration hits him faster than one of Nott’s crossbow bolts. He turns around, hitching his shirt up over his back and brandishing his still-red wounds at him. “This is what happened to me in that cell, scourger, do you see? This is what happens when you survive that cell. These wounds are years old. They burn me every day. This is what he did to me,” tosses his head in Essek’s direction. Doesn’t look up to see his expression. Can’t help but imagine. 

When he turns back around the scourger is somehow even paler. “So think hard. Do you want me to step aside and let him get to work? Do you want to die in that cell? Or do you want to _tell me your name?_ ”

The scourger looks at him. At Fjord’s knuckles, gone white around the bars. At the darkness gathered past him, waiting hungry to pounce. His shoulders slump. 

“Eodwulf,” he whispers. It echoes through the silent cell. “I am Eodwulf.” 

Essek doesn’t move, but Fjord hears him sigh lightly: pleased. He wants to turn towards it like a flower to the sun. He wants to make Essek choke on his own tongue. “Good,” he says softly, “very good. Do you have a last name, Eodwulf?” 

The scourger bites his lip, looks at Fjord, down at the floor. “I- cannot-” 

“It’s okay. It’s okay, listen, _Eodwulf_ , you’ve already been so good.” A little bit of Clay and Jester both sweetening his tongue, and someone else, too, a woman-shaped flicker of memory, a hand on the back of his head holding him close. “Just give me a little more.” 

“Eodwulf Chime. It is the last name they give in Rexxentrum to,” barely whispered, Fjord has to strain to hear, it’s strange that after everything, this is what he’s ashamed of, “to orphans.”

Maybe if Fjord was a better man, a part of him would have ached with recognition, like calling like. Fjord is what he’s made himself, though, and so he thinks, _that will be useful_.

“It’s a fine name.” He gives the scourger the smile he’s seen men use when soothing frantic horses. “Eodwulf Chime.”

“Fjord,” says Essek softly behind him, “tell him your name,” and so Fjord tells Eodwulf his name. 

The exchange seems to give the scourger new life: he leans forward, tugging until he’s at the very end of his chains. Today he seems young, very young; he’s thin in a way that can’t just be a result of his captivity, hollow cheeks and ink-stained fingertips, more suited for a library than the killing field. “I am not _Volstrecker_. Please, you must believe me. I am a child of the Empire, this is true, but I am a, a researcher, I study, books and magic but nothing that could hurt or,” he shudders, “ _kill_. Please,” he gazes at Fjord, past Fjord, beseeching whoever in this room or castle or plane might hear, “let me out. I do not want to die.” 

“Shh, shh, there’s no need to think about anything like that. Of course you’re not going to die. Because you’re helping me, yeah? You’ve been so helpful, Eodwulf. I just need to ask some more questions, make sure you’re not lying-” 

“I would not-”

“And,” Fjord continues firmly, “make sure you weren’t sent here to do anything other than, what was it you said you do? Study magic.” 

The scourger seems to bloom at Fjord’s encouragement. “Yes,” he nods, “yes, I study at the university in Druvenlode, we are on break and, it is so foolish but I have made a special study of magic from outside the Empire and I, I, oh gods help me but I paid a merchant company to bring me with them as they transported supplies to the front lines, I thought that I might slip away and study from healers on the border but, but I strayed too far and,” he hiccups a little on his words, in such a hurry to get them out, “I was captured by your soldiers. I am so sorry, so sorry, my masters have told me that curiosity would get me in trouble and Ioun watch over them, they’re right.” 

“So you’re a student,” Fjord says encouragingly. “Just here to study, not to wage war.” 

“Never, sir! I have always wished for peace between the Empire and the Dynasty. War is a terrible thing.” The scourger peers past Fjord, eyes narrowing as he tries to make out shapes in the dark. “I am sorry for my earlier rudeness, master Krynn, and you too, Mister Fjord. I was scared, and I still am, but that is no excuse. I ask that you do not hold it against me, and treat me with the fairness that your Queen is known for, even behind Empire borders.” 

It’s a pretty speech, and if Fjord was in charge, he might allow himself to be swayed. But he isn’t: Essek is all of a sudden beside Fjord, moving so quickly into the light Fjord swears he can still see shadows clinging desperately to his body. His words are a snake’s soft hiss: “A sad tale, yes, and one you should thank your owner for; it would fool nearly anyone.” He doesn’t look at Fjord. “But you’ve made a mistake, scourger. A small one, but enough to cost your life.” 

“I do not lie, lord, I do not-” 

“There are no universities in Druvenlode.” 

When the scourger looks up, it’s at Fjord, not Essek. When the scourgers smiles, the only thing stopping Fjord from stepping back, away, far, far away, are Essek’s fingers, wrapped tight and cold around Fjord’s wrist. 

“Oh, no,” the scourger says. His voice is pleasant. His smile is not. “Caught. But be honest, little Hündchen,” and Fjord doesn’t know what that means but the way the scourger says it, the involuntary huff Essek lets out, the way they both just - look at him - he knows, he knows. “You were falling for me, weren’t you.” Eyes still intent on Fjord: “You should train your puppies better, Shadowhand.” 

“This is going to hurt,” Essek says, just as sweetly. Oh. Oh, gods. 

“No,” Fjord says, “please, I’m not ready-”, and the protests are only half for the scourger’s benefit. But it’s useless: Essek is already squeezing his hand, and the world is already going to gold and shadow.

Essek explained it like this: antimagic fields are just that. Centuries of Krynn research hasn’t found a loophole, which makes interrogating prisoners with wills too strong to crack with fists - difficult. But not all magic is arcane. There are cracks in the earth where nothing will grow, corners of this plane that refuse being mapped. Old magic. Devil magic. Still useless against an antimagic field - on its own. But when combined with Krynn magic and the right kind of caster, the strange, rare soul that can hold both within their mind and not go entirely mad- 

The first time Essek saw Fjord call upon Ukatoa’s power, the light in his eyes was a beacon, calling Fjord home. He didn’t know better back then. He does now. 

The magic slams into Fjord without waiting for permission. The Shadowhand’s power is familiar by now, but its presence will never fail to make Fjord’s body feel like an alien thing he only half-inhabits. Beneath Essek’s hand he starts to glow, the dark gray and blue and gold of Krynn magic sending sparks that would in any other situation be beautiful beneath his skin. When Essek withdraws, the magic remains, pulsing globules of light that cast shadows of Fjord’s very own through the small cell. He is lit inside and out with Essek’s magic; it burns in his body and at his heart. 

Essek is saying something - he always does - but Fjord can’t hear anything right now, can’t see anything but the magic that races through his blood, taking hold of the arcane energy already hammered into his bones and twisting, fusing, manipulating it into something entirely new. There’s power in Fjord now, new, ancient power, and he likes the way it feels. 

The scourger is still watching him. There’s a sneer on his face, and Fjord wants it gone. (Essek is a blade at his back, and he wants to consume it. _Focus, focus, focus._ )

Then something happens. 

Several things happen.

(This is magic made to rip minds apart; this is magic made to hurt, and to feed. The scourger’s secret is locked deep away inside his mind, but he has no right to keep it, because Fjord wants it, and he will not be denied. _Such weak bones, they’d crack so easy_. His magic grows claws.) 

(“I’m not going to sic him on you today,” Essek is saying, somewhere far away. “But I need you to understand, scourger, that I can, and I will.” The scourger is responding, or sobbing, they both sound the same. It hurts to breathe, hurts to do anything but- give in to the magic pushing him to devour, to devour, to devour; to hold it back, to remember having a body and having a heart; to hold himself captive, when all he wants to do is hurt.)

( _But isn’t it worth it_ , Ukatoa whispers - Essek whispers - Fjord whispers, to see the way the scourger’s eyes finally, finally widen, to see the way his mouth finally, finally parts. The scourger is afraid, and Fjord is going to make him break.)

(Essek’s hand is locked around Fjord’s neck now, a collar or a caress. “Show him just a taste,” Essek whispers; and Fjord lowers his head and reaches his hand and his magic out, and _pushes_ , and the scourger _screams_ , and Essek stays silent but his fingers tighten, and Fjord knows that means ‘good’.) 

When Fjord comes back to his body, he’s on his knees in an empty corridor, gagging on his own tongue. Beneath him is the floor, and Essek’s feet - he’ll have to remember to tell Jester that they do touch the ground, and now he’s laughing, and hiccuping, and sobbing wetly, and then vomiting. His hands, these hands, did that; his brain, this brain, wanted that. His body. This body. 

When Fjord finally looks up, Essek is looking down at him as if from a gruesome height. The corridor is dark, and Fjord’s body is heavy, and if there is something to be understood in the Shadowhand’s expression Fjord would pay anything - his soul, his ship, his falchion - not to know what it is. 

The first time, Fjord couldn’t stop shaking. Because he liked it, and because he hated that his body couldn’t do this on its own. And because he wanted more, and because, most of all, he hated himself, for the wanting. 

At the time, he’d felt like he could say this kind of thing to Essek, and that Essek might in turn understand. At the time, Fjord was an idiot. 

Essek had taken him back to his quarters. Fjord can’t really remember them, except that there were a lot of uncomfortable brocaded pillows, and that it reminded him of his own rooms here in Roshana, or at least, the emptiness had. He wasn’t sure what he’d been expecting from a man who just shoved over a century of potent drow magic into his body and forced him to flay a triton half to death just to get the name of a glass manufacturer in a place called Whitestone. It wasn’t tea; it wasn’t Essek, draped over a tastefully muted couch; it wasn’t Essek not quite meeting his eyes as he told the story about the first spell he ever cast and complaining about the fluctuating prices of arcane foci during war. 

(Essek’s sheets are made of silk. Fjord thought about telling Jester this, but then he didn’t. They felt cool on his skin.)

As the purple and the gold leeched slowly from the world, Fjord had very carefully explained that this was a one-time transgression. He was not a soldier; he was not a monster. The list of his sins was already long enough, and he was making enough additions on his own. The Dynasty got what they wanted, but surely Essek had seen that that hideous magic couldn’t be allowed out again. The Krynn are odd, but they’re not cruel. 

Essek’s smile was fond enough that Fjord had thought - had known - that he empathized. That there was kindness somewhere in his heart, just waiting for the right moment to blossom. 

Essek came to fetch him three days later. It’s been six months, and Fjord’s stopped looking for the bloom. 

“Tomorrow, we will try again,” Essek says, toying with his sleeve. 

Fjord pauses at the house’s threshold. “So soon?” He’s asking for himself more than the scourger. Usually they wait at least a week between these sessions, which lets the prisoners spend a sleepless night or two sweating over what happened, and what might happen next; and also lets Fjord remember how to work his limbs and his mouth on their own. Neither of them know the limits of this unholy magic they’ve created, or what letting it inhabit Fjord’s body this often will do to him. He may practice a lot, but Fjord doesn’t really want to die. 

“We’ll use a more traditional method of questioning tomorrow. The Volstrucker undergo extensive training to resist all forms of interrogation, although,” his lips quirk, “their leader may not have developed countermeasures against you yet.” Fjord ducks his head, trying to focus on Essek’s words rather than the heat and the anger they stoke in his gut. “If, now that our guest has seen the alternative to compliance, he will perhaps be… more incentivized to comply.” 

“And if he isn’t?” 

Essek smiles. There’s warmth in it, but burning too hot for Fjord’s liking. “Then he’ll be the rare, lucky man who knows what face his death wears.” 

The house is silent when he gets back, and it’s silent when he wakes up. Clay’s in the living room communing silently with his plants, and Fjord politely ignores that part of downstairs. Jester and Nott are nowhere to be found, and Beau left late last night - she has her own Shadowhand missions, which leave her bruised and silent in a way Fjord achingly understands. Fjord’s tried to talk to her about it, using a gentle, inviting lilt from Vessarian, the Damalian drug runner who would buy Fjord candy when they’d watch his corner; there’s something about the way he slouched into his spine and made his mouth go lopsided that always made people want to relax right alongside him. But it hasn’t worked on Beau, yet. That kind of thing never does, but Fjord’s going to keep trying, until he finds the right voice. 

It’s dim and quiet here, in the house they call home. Sometimes Fjord will close his eyes and pretend like he’s underwater, and also that he’s drowning. Lately he can’t seem to drown: they fought a kraken three weeks ago, which sounds like a lie. When they finally hauled Fjord out of the ocean he’d already been underwater for five minutes. He was barely out of breath. Until Jester mentioned it to Essek a few days later and he turned that luminous gaze towards Fjord, and then the air vanished from his lungs and the world around him. 

“Fascinating,” was all he’d said. That word is dangerous in Essek’s mouth, and from the look Jester shot him behind his back, she knew the same. 

Still, it’s almost a relief to see Essek in the morning. From the orphanage to the docks to the sea to this group, Fjord’s never been alone, not really. Roshana is the most solitude he’s ever had, and he’s finding he doesn’t like it. Ukatoa doesn’t talk to him this far inland, and he doesn’t have a divine quest or a quasi-incarcerated husband to occupy those rare hours the Shadowhand doesn’t have him. Sometimes he goes down to the market to hunt for new voices - he found an interesting old half-drow who slurs their Vs and has an unique way of moving their hands when they talk - but Essek is, as always, immediately the more interesting prospect. 

“I thought on it last night, and decided that you will go alone this time,” Essek says. He’s wearing blue and golden robes, which would look vibrant on anyone else but are somehow made dull against Essek’s complexion. The soldiers who report directly to him all have their own unique way of incorporating the Shadowhand colors into their wardrobe, a sprig of violets here, a gold tassel here. Fjord’s greatest fear is that one day Essek will present him with a spool of goldenrod thread and an expectant look. 

Essek’s silence is a pointed frown, bordering on a scowl: _you are being inattentive, which is a hobby not many in my company keep for long_. “Yes, I’ll go- Alone?” He all but runs face-first into a hulking minotaur holding a tray of buns above her horns; Essek doesn’t move to help as he stumbles around the scowling woman. “I’ve never done this alone. I don’t even think I can.” 

“Like I said yesterday, I’m not asking you to use any magic on our friend today. Instead today you will be speaking with him… man-to-man. He’s heard our threats, and also seen them. Now that he’s had some time to think about what silence will cost him, I believe he will be much more responsive.” 

That sounds like bullshit, and Fjord says so. Essek raises his eyebrows, which means he’s laughing at Fjord. “It does, doesn’t it? But indulge me, if you would. Before the last part of our conversation, he was… responding to you. Don’t give me that look, something about you was drawing him in - certainly not the persona you used, but the man beneath. I believe that speaking plainly, and _alone_ , will make our friend much more amenable to truth-telling.” 

Fjord disagrees, but something about Essek’s proposition is… intriguing. He hates what he has to do in there: hates the screaming, hates the blood, hates the alien power choking up his throat and oozing from his pores. Hates the way he feels in those moments, like he could spend his entire life drawing screams from throats like notes from an instrument and never get bored, never want for anything. (Is this how Yasha feels, he’s wondered, is this why she left, and then he doesn’t want to think about Yasha any more and so he stops.) 

Essek’s suggestion is a way out. This way doesn’t have pain, or not as much. This way lets Fjord smile, and talk, and maybe offer kindness, and it lets him not become a monster. Lets Fjord comply with Essek without really complying; lets Fjord keep the rest of them safe without selling his soul. 

The Dynasty has used him as a weapon, but maybe instead he can become- Clay would know what the opposite of a weapon is ( _a_ _flower_ , or _hope_ , or a mysterious firbolg smile), but Clay isn’t here, so Fjord just nods agreement. 

“Are you ready to try again?” 

The scourger watches Fjord with an unreadable expression. Fjord’s magic doesn’t leave bruises, but there are enough on his skin already. The last time Fjord saw him he was huddled in a ball on the floor, shuddering in fear or misery, or both; now his face is drawn, but composed. He’s filthy, and it doesn’t look like he’s slept, so at least they have that in common. 

Fjord shuts the door firmly behind him: see? Just you and me. Probably less reassuring than it would have been this time yesterday. He tries for a reassuring smile, part Marion Lavorre, part Reani, but the scourger’s face doesn’t change. 

“I’m not going to, you know, again.” He makes a vague wavy hand motion. “Today we’re just talking. Just you and me.” 

The scourger doesn’t relax. They’ve removed the chains, and he’s propped up in a corner of the cell with his knees drawn to his chest. It makes him look young. By now the antimagic field must feel like a hornet’s nest, but it doesn’t seem to affect him, or else he’s very good at pretending. 

“Where is your master?” His voice is rougher than yesterday, and Fjord doesn’t even try to convince himself it’s because his throat is dry.

“He’s not my master.” 

“Are you sure? You go where he says, you do what he wants…” The scourger frowns. “You become what he commands. What do you call that?” 

Fjord puts his hands in his pockets, leans against the wall. During the long walk down he shuffled through faces and voices, but none quite seemed right - this one too rude, this one too needy. He settles on Eleven Clover, an old tabaxi midshipman who sailed on Fjord’s first ship, quiet and thoughtful, but quick to laugh. Fjord misses him, whenever he remembers to. “Not sure. Lotta words for a relationship like that, some good, some bad. But, you know, it’s interesting.” 

He takes the bait. “What is?” 

“That you’d go straight to ‘master’.” 

The scourger’s mouth twitches, which is strange in a place like this. The scourger probably realizes that, too, because it fades almost immediately. 

“Master or not, summon your demons and be done with it. I will not give you my name, or any other part of myself.” 

Fjord grins with summery confidence. “You will. But don’t worry about it, we have time.” 

He settles down across from the scourger, sprawls his legs out in front of him. Clover always had a spur of wood and a pocket knife at hand, but Fjord’s pretty certain Essek would frown at whittling during military interrogations. He laces his hands in front of himself instead. 

“So. Did you sleep well?”

The scourger glowers at him. “Please do not play games. I am ready for my death, and I do not want to be toyed with beforehand.” 

“I know I can’t convince you,” Fjord says, “but I’m gonna try anyway, so hear me out. Nothing’s gonna happen today, except for some conversation. You know what’s gonna happen if you don’t talk. Felt it yesterday. That was just a taste. It’ll be a lot longer tomorrow, and you’ll still be alive at the end of it, and at the end of the next day, and the day after that. But I’m hoping that we can avoid all that, and talk today.” 

A long silence follows. Fjord considers his fingertips as the scourger considers him. Finally: “What is that thing. The thing that comes out of you?” 

“I don’t know.” 

“Liar.” 

“Sure,” Fjord agrees easily. The scourger sneers, and Fjord doesn’t follow-up, just lets the silence stretch on, taut on one end, lax on the other. 

Finally, the scourger said: “That is why I called him your master. Because if you are not lying - and I think that you are lying - but if you are not, then you are either a fool, to let him do that to you, or else you are a mindless slave.” 

He snorts. “A fool or a slave? Those are my only choices?” 

The scourger tilts his head a little to the side, considering Fjord. “Hmm.” After a moment he leans forward, leaning his elbows against his knees. “There is a third option.” He repeats that word he used yesterday: “A little lapdog, barking for approval. Considering the way you look at him, maybe it is the only option.” 

Well.

Eleven Clover has fled, and in his place is Fjord, just Fjord, cheeks warm and insides twisting. Before he can stop himself he blurts out: “I’m not. I’m not that.” And from the way scourger looks at him, Fjord knows that he’s lost. 

He can handle teasing from Beau and Nott - he’s practically been inoculated from anything Jester could ever throw at him. But something about the way the scourger is looking at him now, like Fjord is some insect to be pinned squirming to a board and dissected, or admired, or simply possessed; it reminds Fjord of the way Essek looks at him when he discovers that Fjord can’t drown, or that Fjord can eat magic swords, or that Fjord can swallow Krynn magic inside of his body and transmute it into something terrible and glorious. 

Fjord’s discomfort must be written across his face in bold, because the scourger bears down harder, that smirk from yesterday reappeared triumphant. “Do you roll over on your back for him, asking him to scratch your belly? Does he give you treats when you sit and when you wag your tail? He must feel very proud, to have found someone so eager to perform for his amusement.” 

He grasps for - Avantika, Ophelia, Beau, anyone who can take a man’s insults and turn them into a cudgel: but in the place where his masks live there’s just Fjord, useless, weak Fjord.

The scourgers are trained in this, Essek had warned him, getting under your skin, making you question yourself rather than them. _But you’re better than that. You won’t let him beat you_. Yesterday, Fjord would have believed him; but take Essek away, take his voices and his powers away, and where does that leave him? What does that leave him? 

The scourger leans forward, smiling with his teeth. After being beaten and starved and humiliated, finally there’s blood in the water, and he’s ready to feast. “I do not think you have even realized it, have you?” He waits for Fjord to respond, and the silence is somehow worse than any response Fjord could muster. “The way you look at him is worse than the way he speaks to you. You are so strong, you have so much power, but you let him use you like this, and you thank him for his own pleasure.”

The Bright Queen, Dairon, even Nala - every persona slips through his fingers like sand. 

“I can hear from your accent that you are from the Menagerie Coast. Tell me, had we found you before him, had we offered to shake you by the collar like an insolent puppy every so often, would you have fallen to your knees for us as well?” 

Three knocks, Essek had said, if anything goes wrong _listen for three knocks._ The only sound is his heartbeat in his ear. 

Vandran; the voice he uses the most often, the persona he wears like a second skin. He manages to keep his voice and his gaze steady, holding his captain’s identity in front of him like a shimmering veil. “You’d think scourgers are trained to talk, you babble so much.” 

“No, Hündchen, Master Ikithon trained us to be the _best_. Clearly, whoever raised you did not have the same aspirations.” The scourger over Fjord’s head towards the door, raising his voice: “Excuse me, I have grown bored and I have grown weary. Take the puppy away so that he may kill me tomorrow.” 

Silence, that terrible sound. Now, the scourger seems to revel in it; now, if Fjord could he would drown in it. 

But finally, finally: three knocks. And surely, Essek behind them; Essek, who was listening at the door. Essek, who heard every word. 

Later Fjord won’t remember getting to his feet, or walking to the door, or meeting the eyes of the soldiers who stood guard inches away. He won’t remember the long walk up the stairs into the Shadowspire, or the midday sky as they walked through the Firmaments, or the feel of the door against his back as he slid to the ground, blank, quiet. 

He’ll remember the bright gold and blue of Essek’s robes, flashing in the sun as he leaned over to press his fingertips, so light it might not have happened, against the small of Fjord’s back. Fjord doesn't know what that means. 

He’ll remember Essek leaning closer than Fjord ever remembers him being, to murmur low as he guided Fjord through the tunnels deep, deep beneath the Bright Queen’s throne, “In his eagerness to show off, he has given us a name. He’s cracking, and tomorrow he will break.” And then, almost too soft to be believed: “Very good, Fjord.” 

And he’ll remember the scourger’s smile, too. 


End file.
